Alphabet soup
I came across a photo from the early days of my garden and was pleased to see how healthy the chard plants were, and my first thought was that I had regular access to a hillside of free-range cow poop back then. This would have been only the second or third year of that garden bed. The poop helped, but so did pine straw, grass clippings and the periodic table.
Therefore, here is A to Z for building healthy soil.
Avoid toxic chemical sprays and powders. There are naturally organic options, and tiny useful critters in the soil can’t abide poisons.
Bacteria naturally occurs in well-composed, regularly tended compost, and it breaks down leaves and apple cores into a useful soil additive.
Compacted is not a happy description of soil. Water pools on top of compacted soil unable to penetrate, seeds struggle to break through, and plants can barely breathe.
Diversity in a garden bed gives plants an opportunity to be mutually beneficial to each other. Smelly plants (marigolds, basil) deter pests from neighbors. Pea vines provide shade for lettuce, plus plants communicate underground and they don’t need passwords.
E is for everything a gardener does to enrich the soil.
Fungi squiggling around in soil help to decompose organic matter which makes soil healthier. Support your local fungi by adding mulch and compost to garden beds. If you are gardening and hear a faint rendition of “We Are Family,” it’s probably the fungi.
Greensand is found in specific ocean locales, and it is a useful amendment for adding potassium.
H is for help from natural processes, humor to see you through, hard but worthwhile work to achieve the humus harmony the world needs.
Iron deficiency is indicated by yellow leaves.
Just keep working it. Good soil takes time.
Kick my troubles out the door, I don’t need them anymore…
Legumes (beans, peas, alfalfa) absorb nitrogen from the air and add it to the soil. Cool!
Mulch moderates soil moisture and soil temperature, plus it breaks down thereby adding organic matter to the soil, and those are good things. Just pull back mulch to give seedlings room to grow. Mix up the components of your mulch. Maybe you live near an ocean, and you can get seaweed.
Nitrogen makes for shiny green leaves, but too much relative to phosphorus and potassium produces healthy leaves but fewer fruit. Find a balance. Animal manure is a good source of nitrogen. I prefer aged horsey because of the texture it adds as it breaks down.
Organic philosophy means accommodating natural processes in your garden to produce healthy plants.
P is for a gardener’s purpose which is to leave your soil in friable, nutrient-rich condition. Whoever comes next will be lucky.
Quite a list we have going here.
Rotate crops among different spots in your garden. Tomatoes in the same spot year after year would deplete that patch of soil of particular nutrients and invite tomato pests and problems to settle in. Don’t do that.
Soil is a universe unto itself. Take care of soil; soil takes of plants.
Tiny is the size of the chemicals and organisms in the soil on which plants depend. It wasn’t me, but somebody counted more than 10,000 different species among the billion individual cells in a teaspoon of healthy soil. Microbes make the soil world go around. T also stands for turnips.
Unused dried herbs from last year make valuable mulch.
Vetch family members make good green manure.
W is all about worms. Where would the world be without worms?
X marks the spot where the treasure is buried.
You, dedicated gardener, have the good fortune of a never-ending art project. Let your Monet run wild!
Zebra poop is great if you can get it.